


Escape Velocity

by marywhale



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Canon-Typical Violence, Enemies to Friends, F/M, Humor, M/M, Post-Episode: e050 Lunar Interlude IV: The Calm Before the Storm, Reaper Squad
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-15
Updated: 2019-04-15
Packaged: 2020-01-13 17:26:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,655
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18473632
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/marywhale/pseuds/marywhale
Summary: There is an incorporeal form hovering above Taako — a woman, who wears Taako’s face, phantasmal and resplendent, cloaked in a red robe. Her eyes are full of scorn as she looks down at Kravitz, like this lich thinksheis the one who poses a danger here.Kravitz breaks the umbrastaff and frees Lup early. His life gets a lot more complicated.





	Escape Velocity

**Author's Note:**

  * For [terezis](https://archiveofourown.org/users/terezis/gifts).



> This fic is based on an idea terezis floated on tumblr and [this exchange](http://terezis.tumblr.com/post/182815097094) between her and anonymousAlchemist. Full credit to them for the inception of this concept and also for asking me to write it.

The fake moon’s quad is lovely at night. The pathways that criss-cross the base are lit by softly glowing streetlights and the weather is cool and clear — there’s a faint breeze, ruffling Taako’s hair as he and Kravitz walk together, holding a misshapen vase Kravitz didn’t expect to make tonight. Taako’s smiling at him, flushed from the wine they drank during their… Kravitz isn’t sure _what_ to call it. It was supposed to be a business meeting. A negotiation.

It feels an awful lot like a date.

There’s really only one way to know for sure. “Taako,” Kravitz says, turning to face him. “I want to know…”

“Yes?” Taako’s looking up at him from under hooded eyes, very pleased with himself. Taako’s the one who suggested the Chug ’n Squeeze for this… _maybe_ -date.

“Was this call for business or pleasure?”

“Yeah, I mean, a little bit of both,” Taako says, after a beat. The pleased look on his face has been replaced with something more open — more honest. “I, uh, for _sure_ didn't want to be dragged to hell or whatever it is you do. Stored in the ghost house with Casper and the lot? Don't wanna do that. In the mirror, if I remember? I am _not_ interested in that. But I, like, also, I love your style.” He shrugs. “Not crazy about the sort of cold clamminess of the skin, but like... yeah, you know? It's been a while out here.”

It’s been a while for Kravitz too. _Much_ longer than it’s been for Taako. And Taako’s... _charming_ , in an unconventional way. Handsome. Funny. Kravitz finds himself leaning towards him, thinking about suggesting that maybe next time they meet it should be _all_ pleasure — except not phrased like he’s propositioning Taako, phrased like a normal person would ask someone on a second date — when he’s hit with a wave of powerful necrotic energy.

He starts, stepping back and summoning his scythe into his hand, his cloak unfurling around him as his flesh melts away.

“Love this,” says Taako, as if Kravitz’s face isn’t a skull now.

“There's something here,” Kravitz says, urgently, looking around the quad. “There's something here, Taako, it was —”

“I feel it too,” says Taako, stepping close again..

“It was — no, not this the —” Kravitz feels flustered as he scans the quad for any sign of the thing he felt. This is the _worst_ time for some undead big bad to come into the picture. It’s like it’s trying to ruin Kravitz’s definitely-a-date-now. “There's something here. It was in the Millers’ lab too — I could feel it. It's dead and it's powerful and it's extremely close.”

Kravitz pauses. Something that was in the Millers’ lab and that seemed to try and ruin their date on purpose. A date that’s maybe a _distraction_ and not a date at all. He turns his attention back to Taako, looking him over. “Are you harboring a dark spirit, Taako? Do you have suspicions that you might be some sort of vessel?“

Taako looks — confused. Genuinely confused. “Maybe?” he says, squinting like he’s trying to remember. “I mean, it's been, like, a few years... was that a thing for a while? I eat old dead dudes with my umbrella, is that a possibility, maybe?”

Kravitz turns his gaze to the umbrella in Taako’s hand. It’s red with a curved wood handle. The wood is warm with age and wear and it looks older than an umbrella has any right to look, but Taako uses it as a wand. That accounts for a lot of weirdness, and whatever Kravitz is feeling isn’t a cursed item. It’s something powerful. Something like a _lich_ and he’d _know_ if Taako were a lich. He’d _feel_ it.

Taako holds out the umbrella for Kravitz to examine and Kravitz sees it twitch in his hand.

He’d know if _Taako_ were a lich, but a phylactery could hide _all_ kinds of sins, if the lich who created it was strong enough.

Kravitz reaches for the umbrella and it twitches in Taako’s grasp, like it’s trying to get away. “I think you’re right,” Kravitz says. “Taako, let me see your umbrella.”

“Is it — I mean, I _need_ that, but okay,” Taako says, handing it over.

The umbrella is like a livewire in Kravitz’s hand. He can feel it charging up a spell, even without Taako’s input. It _hates_ him holding it. The umbrella jerks to the side — like someone is trying to tug it out of his hands and back into Taako’s. There’s something very, _very_ wrong with it. Kravitz can barely hang on to the thing.

Taako dances back a few steps, looking concerned. “Is it — cursed? It’s never… okay, I guess it _has_ done this before and it _does_ eat people, but like… _you know_.”

Kravitz does _not_ know. He has no idea. At the very least, the umbrella is obviously possessed and he doesn’t know how to deal with that. He wrestles with the umbrella, tightening his grip on it, and does the only thing he can think to do with the thing — he brings his scythe down on the umbrella, hard, and splits it in two.

It’s like a bomb goes off in his hands. Fire explodes around him, singing his robes. Kravitz is glad he’s in full reaper mode or he’d be hurting, but — _Taako_.

Kravitz reaches out with his magic, intent on shielding Taako, but Taako is... fine. Taako’s standing stock still, eyes wide, staring at Kravitz as the fire weaves expertly around him, like whatever spirit was possessing the umbrella wants to keep its wielder safe from harm.

The fire rages around Kravitz still, and for a moment there is a shape hovering above Taako — a woman, who wears Taako’s face, phantasmal and resplendent, cloaked in a red robe. Her eyes are full of scorn as she looks down at Kravitz. The carved out space around Taako looks _protective_ now — like this lich thinks _Kravitz_ is the one who poses a danger to him.

Before Kravitz can react or fight his way out of flames, the lich folds up around her middle like she got punched in the gut and flies back, away from them, and off the edge of the base.

The fire extinguishes itself as quickly as it came — the only evidence it was ever there a circle of singed grass.

Kravitz is left staring at Taako, who’s clutching his vase tight to his chest, wide-eyed and frozen in place. “What,” Taako says, “the _fuck?_ ”

Kravitz forces himself back into his human form because he’s covered in ash and scorch marks. His poor attempt at a vase is in half-melted pieces on the ground. He scans the horizon, looking for any sign of the lich. “That is a _very_ good question,” he says. “I think I just found my next bounty.”

#

One minute, Lup’s floating in the air above her brother — finally out, finally _free_ — the next she’s been hurled halfway across Faerun, thrown off the moon by a fucking _holy shield_. She rockets through the air, hurtling downwards, trying to regain some control over her trajectory, but even with all the magic in the world at her fingertips, gravity is a bitch. She careens towards the ground, passing through a thick canopy of trees and crashing down somewhere in the middle of nowhere, in a dense forest, because of _course_ she does.

She spent a decade in an umbrella. Why would things get easy _now?_

Lup picked up on some things while she was in the umbrastaff. She heard Lucretia tell Taako, Magnus, and Merle how _evil_ the Red Robes were. She heard the boys talk to Barry, even if _they_ didn’t remember him. Lup knows exactly what Lucretia was doing, telling them to stay clear of Red Robes. Lucretia’s gotten _paranoid_.

Barry must have been really hounding her, for Lucretia to put up shields powerful enough to repel a lich. Lup’s half-surprised the Grim Reaper could hang out on the moon and make eyes at her brother for the whole _wine and pottery_ date thing with the kind of radiant power Lucretia’s ward emits. And also? What the fuck was Taako _thinking_ , asking _literal Death_ on a date?

Her brother might not remember her. He might be operating at, like, a quarter of his actual capacity, but he hasn’t changed one fuckin’ bit. Taako is still Taako. It’d be reassuring if she hadn’t also had to save Taako for certain death multiple times. She’s glad to be out of the umbrastaff, but Taako _needs_ her and now he’s on the moon and she’s on the ground. With Lucretia’s ward between them, he might as well be on another plane of existence.

So she can’t go back for him. Taako’s going to kill her when he gets his memories back.

She should find Barry. Barry’s got to have a plan. He’s had a _decade_ to come up with something — some way to convince Lucretia she’s making a mistake gathering up all the relics. That _has_ to be what she’s doing, sending the boys out to find them. Lucretia is re-making the Light of Creation. She’s going to go through with her plan to raise a shield around the whole planar system.

Stopping the Phoenix Fire Gauntlet from hurting more people was the right thing to do. It was worth dying for and she doesn’t regret it. But also, Lup _maybe_ should have spent more time explaining planar physics to Lucretia before she left. If she did, maybe they wouldn’t be a couple months off from Lucretia cutting off the Material Plane and killing them all.

Lup’s not sure where to start looking for Barry, but figuring out where _she_ is seems like a good first step. She’ll get her bearings, find her boy, and with _both_ of them working on the whole Lucretia’s-going-to-destroy-the-world thing, they’ll have this fixed in no time.

Lucretia still needs the Animus Bell. They’re running out of time to stop her, but maybe Barry knows where his relic ended up.

Lup brushes non-existent dirt from her incorporeal form and squares her shoulders. She’s visited a hundred different planes of existence. So she’s in the middle of an unfamiliar forest — so what? She’s _Lup_. She’s _got this_.

A sound, like fabric tearing, echoes through the woods behind her. Lup turns as the Grim Reaper steps out of a rift between planes, scythe first, his hollow eyes burning red beneath a pitch-black hood.

“Mother _fucker_ ,” Lup says, dropping her hands to her side and readying a spell. “Aren’t you supposed to be on a date right now?”

“Who _are_ you?” Kravitz demands, leveling the blade of his scythe at her. He’s got his work accent on, like she didn’t just hear him tell Taako it was all for show. “What do you want with Taako?”

“I don’t have _time_ for this,” Lup says, and flings a fireball at Kravitz’s head.

Kravitz raises his scythe to block the blast of flames, but the spell explodes when it hits the blade, giving Lup enough cover to duck back, into the trees behind her. She could fight him, but he’s _death_. She’s pretty sure any victory will be temporary.

She has _some_ concern for the environment and she’s in the middle of a forest throwing fire around.

There’s another tearing sound and reality splits open beside her, Kravitz diving out of a rift and launching himself at Lup. She’s got a spell ready to go in the half-second of warning she gets, but Kravitz is on her — trying to hook his blade through her stomach as she shoves a burning hand against his chest.

They both let out a yelp of pain, stumbling apart.

Kravitz’s face is a skull — featureless and expressionless — but the set of his shoulders is wary as he stares her down. “If you come in easy, I might be able to cut you a deal,” he says, lying through his very visible teeth. “I’ve got some questions about why you look like Taako and how you hid your phylactery so well.”

“It wasn’t my fuckin’ phylactery,” Lup says, staring right back. “It was just an umbrella.”

Kravitz obviously doesn’t believe her because he lunges forward again, swinging his scythe and sending a bolt of radiant energy towards her. Lup leaps sideways, but it’s been a while since she had to move fast — the umbrella didn’t have much room for her to stretch her legs.

The spell hits, slamming into her side. She feels the cold burn of holy energy flood her system, tugging at her self-control. For a moment, everything goes fuzzy — her mind, her body, her hold on reality. She _hurts_ and she’s _alone_ and Taako _doesn’t remember her._ Her thoughts are prickly and uneven, brain electric, and it takes everything she has to pull herself together, to not careen violently into _lichdom_ the way the pain wants her to.

Lup’s a lich now, free from the confines of a flesh body. She doesn’t need to breathe.

She’s still panting when she coalesses her form enough to glare at Kravitz. “Are you _trying_ to make me lose my temper?”

Kravitz tilts his head to the side, the flesh reforming over his bones as he watches her. It’s creepy as fuck, but Lup has to admit the dude is hot. Taako’s making wild choices, tricking _actual death_ into a date, but aesthetically? She gets it.

“What _are_ you?” Kravitz asks, sounding less accusatory and more curious this time. “You’re not a normal lich.”

“No shit,” says Lup. “Can I go now? I’m kinda working on a deadline here.”

“You’re still a lich, even if you’re a weird one,” Kravitz says, which is just rude. “I can’t let you _go_.”

“I could take you.” Kravitz might be an aspect of the Raven Queen, but Lup’s the greatest evocation wizard in the universe. She could fuck his pretty face _right_ up. And she _would_ , except her stupid brother likes him and Lup likes Taako. “Listen, Skeletor, if I answer your questions, _then_ can I go? I’m not going to run off and cuss in a temple or whatever. I’ve got a job to do — like Taako’s job. A saving the world type thing.”

Kravitz makes a face that says he _really_ wants to correct her on what constitutes breaking the laws of life and death, but doesn’t immediately shoot down the offer. He looks her over, red eyes calculating and much more shrewd than his behaviour on the date with Taako would indicate. “Tell you what,” he says, crossing his arms over his chest and leaning back against the tree behind him. His scythe stays in his hand, propped against his shoulder. “I’ll make you a deal.”

It’s not a get out of ghost jail free card, but it’s a way to avoid fighting the Grim Reaper. What’s Lup got to lose? “What kind of deal?”

“You tell me why you look like Taako and what you were doing in his umbrella, and if you can give me a reasonable explanation for why I shouldn’t drag you to the Eternal Stockade right now, then I won’t.” He pauses. “If you _don’t_ offer a reasonable explanation, we’ll play a game for your soul instead. Your choice.”

Lup chews on her bottom lip, thinking it over. Kravitz heard about the relics from Taako. He saw what the Philosopher’s Stone was capable of, and he’s dead — he’ll be able to hear what she’s saying. If he was willing to bargain with the Raven Queen on Taako’s behalf, maybe he’ll cut Lup some slack too.

Plus, Lup’s abso _lutely_ certain she can kick his ass at pool.

“Yeah, okay. You’ve got yourself a deal,” she says, sitting down on the forest floor. She pats the ground beside her. “There’s a lot to explain so take a seat, Reaper-man. It’s gonna be a long night.”

#

Kravitz can feel a headache coming on. He pinches the bridge of his nose. “Let me get this straight,” he says. “You’re Taako’s twin sister, who he forget, because there are _two_ voidfish — you _think_ — and Taako’s boss fed all the evidence of your existence to the second one?”

“Yep,” says Lup. “I mean, I’m extrapolating based on the evidence I’ve got, but it makes the most sense.”

“Sure,” says Kravitz, doing his best not to sound hysterical as he drops his hand, looking at the lich in front of him. Her story is fantastical and nonsensical — interplanar explorers, running across the multiverse, chased by an unending hunger, a persistent force that consumes everything in its path. Kravitz wouldn’t believe it, except it lines up with everything Taako told him about the Bureau of Balance and accounts for the origins of the seven relics Taako and his friends are hunting down.

Also, Lup is _obviously_ Taako’s twin.

The sun is starting to rise. Kravitz has had a long night — an unexpected date followed by an unexpected lich.

“So,” says Lup. “We good? Because I’ve kind of got a whole, like, _apocalypse_ to stop. I love Lucretia, but she fucked this up royally. The Hunger’s coming and me and my boy are the only things standing in it’s way — as soon as I track him down.”

“Your boyfriend who is also a lich,” Kravitz says, just to make sure they’re on the same page here.

“Yeah,” says Lup. “Look, _you_ spend 82 years running from the apocalypse and see if you don’t feel inclined to tear _your_ soul out, babe. It was a _rough_ century.”

It sounds rough. It sounds unimaginably hard — running with no end in sight, always chased, the weight of world after world they failed to save on their shoulders, knowing every year that they might not escape this time. It sounds hard, and Kravitz... believes her. His gut tells him Lup is telling the truth, but he serves his goddess, not his gut, and he’s got a job to do.

A job with clear guidelines when it comes to dealing with liches. A job with rules Kravitz can _normally_ find a way to work around, but which are making things difficult now.

The rules don’t account for the end of the world.

Kravitz studies Lup’s face — _so_ much like Taako’s — and weighs his options. As a reaper, there’s only so much he can do — only so much he’s _allowed_ to do.

“Okay,” he says. “You know what? This is above my pay grade.” He pushes himself off the tree he’s learning against and cuts open a rift to the astral plane.

“You said we had a deal!” Lup says, shooting upright as flames burst from her phantasmal form, enveloping her completely.

“Calm _down_ ,” says Kravitz. He just wants to rest. To have some time to consider whether or not he can text Taako about going on a second date when he now knows more about Taako’s life and past than Taako knows about himself. Ethically, he’s pretty sure the answer is no, but also he _likes_ Taako. “You’re not under arrest.”

“Sure,” says Lup. “I’m just _detained_ , is that it?”

“This is above my pay grade,” Kravitz repeats. “I’m taking you to see my boss.”

The flames go out and Lup stares at him, incredulous. “You want me, a lich, to go with you to the astral plane to talk to the _Raven Queen?_ ”

When Lup puts it like that it does sound absurd, but Kravitz holds his ground. “Yes,” he says. “I’m taking you for an audience with her so we can explain…” He waves a hand at, just, everything. “All of this.”

“No,” says Lup. “No fuckin’ _way_ , Ghost Rider. Do I _look_ like I was born yesterday? I’m not getting in that rift.”

“I made you a deal,” Kravitz says. “I don’t break those. If what you’re saying is true, don’t you think it would help to have the gods on your side?” He pauses, because right — Taako. “Your brother pledged himself to Istus. If what you say is true, I’m sure the goddess of fate will support you too. She’s good friends with my queen.” Lup still doesn’t look convinced. Kravitz can’t blame her, but he’d also really like to figure out his game plan here and for that he needs the Raven Queen. “I promise no harm will come to you.”

Lup hesitates, glancing at his scythe, and then at the rift. “Okay, fuck it,” she says. “I’ll come see your spooky queen, but if you lock me up, there’s no way in _hell_ Taako’s gonna keep dating you once he gets his memory back.”

“That’s —” Kravitz frowns. “Wait, do you think he wants a second date?”

Lup snorts. “Not if you lock me up for trying to save the multiverse he doesn’t,” she says and steps through the rift.

Lup is definitely trying to throw him off. Kravitz wishes it wasn’t working. He follows her through, into the antechamber to the Raven Queen’s throne room. Here, at least, he has the advantage.

“Follow me in,” he tells Lup. “Be respectful. Tell her everything you told me about your mission and why you became a lich. Necromancers always think she’s unkind, but she’s not — death is the great equalizer. There is no god as fair or as just as the Raven Queen.”

“Spoken like a true fanboy,” Lup says, glancing around the chamber. “Gotta say I like the aesthetic though. She’s got good taste.”

“I’m not a —” Kravitz cuts himself off. Bickering with Lup isn’t going to solve his problem. Better to just ignore her. “She has _very_ good taste, yes.”

The Raven Queen’s hall is made of a glinting black stone that shines like glass. Colours swirl under its surface and it’s speckled with pinpricks of light. The effect is not unlike being suspended in the night sky, surrounded by stars. It’s cool and still and smells faintly of ozone, a scent Kravitz as come to think of as _home_.

Kravitz has always found it comforting. He’s spent his death in service to the Raven Queen, but if fate had dealt him a different hand, he would have found the sea outside — the resting place of thousands of souls waiting to be reborn — peaceful.

“Quiet though, huh?” Lup glances at him. “We doing this?”

Right. Kravitz nods and steps forward, raising a hand to knock on the massive doors in front of them — doors made of the same stone as the rest of the hall, engraved with a pattern that suggests two raven’s wings, folded shut. Before his fist connects with the surface, the doors swing open inwards.

The Raven Queen sits on her throne, a towering presence at the end of a long, black carpet. Her form is hard to focus on — hands small and human one moment, long and taloned the next. Her dress is made of layers and layers of black silk and gossamer, obscuring her frame entirely. She wears a dark veil like a shroud, hiding her face from view.

“Kravitz,” she says, voice ringing with the cry of carrion birds — a warning Kravitz hears loud and clear. “You’ve brought a lich to my inner sanctum.”

Kravitz bows deeply. “My queen,” he says. “If you would favour her with an audience, she’s expanded on the story I passed on to you — the one from my most recent bounty.”

“The servant of Istus.” The Raven Queen doesn’t move, but her throne is suddenly much closer to the entrance of the hall. Kravitz can feel her reaching through the connection they share, examining the shape of Kravitz’s heart and mind, his unwavering devotion to her and his belief in Lup’s story.

“You believe what this lich has told you?” she asks, although she knows the answer already. Kravitz suspects it’s more for Lup’s benefit than her own.

“I do, my lady.” Kravitz raises his head to look at her veiled face. “I beg you to indulge my request.”

The Raven Queen turns her attention to Lup beside him and nods, once. “Speak.”

“Oh,” says Lup. “Shit, uh, okay. Cool.”

Kravitz has a moment to regret his choices, but Lup steels herself and stands up straighter, eyes on the Raven Queen’s veil. “The end of the world is coming,” she says. “Not just the deaths of everyone on the material plane — the end of _everything_. There is a hunger coming that has consumed dozens of worlds. It consumed the planar system I’m from and it will consume this one too unless you give me the chance to stop it. Me and my friends — my _family_ — have been on the run for a hundred years, fighting and fleeing and trying to save everyone we could, skipping from planar system to planar system. We’ve done terrible things to try and stop the Hunger, but we have a _chance_ , still, to save this world and all the souls in it. Please, your Queenship, let me _try_.”

The Raven Queen is silent as she studies Lup, head tilting to the side as she takes her in. If he needed to breathe, Kravitz would hold his breath.

“I see the truth of what you claim,” the Raven Queen says, after a long moment. “My reaper has shown me the story you told him. I believe you.” Lup pumps her fist beside Kravitz. “ _However_ , there is still the matter of you being a lich. Death does not make exceptions.” She extends a hand, fingers tipped with sharp claws, and touches Lup’s cheek. Lup talked a big game before, but Kravitz can see the tension in her shoulders. She’s _scared_. Kravitz knows from experience that it’s one thing to know the Raven Queen in theory and another to meet her in person. She is terrifying and beautiful — god of a force which no one can outrun forever.

“People complain that death is cruel. Unfair. They are wrong. There is no greater justice. Death comes for everyone. It is the natural way of things. My laws are absolute.” The Raven Queen releases Lup’s face and sits back in her throne. “However, my servants are not as bound to the law as I am. My reaper, I see, has made a vow.”

Kravitz bows his head again. “I did, my queen.”

The Raven Queen nods in agreement. “No harm will come to you in my realm.”

“Wait,” says Lup. “What?”

“And yet, I cannot allow a lich to roam free.”

Kravitz is hit with a sudden sense of foreboding — a premonition that something awful is about to happen because he _has_ left the Raven Queen with very few choices here. She is still a goddess. She could break his word, but he brought Lup here certain she wouldn’t and the Raven Queen knows that. She’s honouring his loyalty. She’s going to let him keep his promise.

“My rule must not be questioned and my law must be absolute. And so, I offer you the chance to redeem yourself instead. I would bind you to my service, a servant sworn to uphold my laws and preserve the natural order of things — to protect the balance of life and death. I would make you a reaper.”

Lup looks as shocked as Kravitz feels. She glances at Kravitz, like she’s waiting for him to protest the Raven Queen’s offer, but he can’t. She’s his goddess. He may interpret her rules broadly, may circumvent them or argue for leniency when the occasion calls for it, but he won’t defy her directly.

There’s nothing he can say. He backed the Raven Queen into a corner and now she’s returning the favour.

After a beat, Lup grins, bowing to the Raven Queen in a poor imitation of Kravitz’s posture. “Sure,” she says, straightening up to look at her again. “If you’re offering me a job, your holiness, I accept. Make me a reaper.”

Kravitz hasn’t had a day go off the rails this badly since Candlenights.

**Author's Note:**

> Please leave a comment and kudos if you enjoyed the start of this fic! I'm looking forward to getting the next chapter up soon. <3
> 
> You can come and say hi to me on tumblr also, where I'm [@marywhal](http://marywhal.tumblr.com) and very happy to chat.


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